Are you familiar with “The Four Agreements” by Don Miguel Ruiz? If so, are you living into these four agreements in service of your vision?

These four agreements are a way to really hold ourselves accountable to really be in service of our vision and to live a more fulfilled life.

When we know the four agreements and we hold ourselves accountable to them, they become a powerful guiding light of a way of being in the world. And at first glance, they seem quite simple!

The first agreement that Don Miguel Ruiz talks about is to be impeccable with your word. The power of your thoughts and your words that ultimately cause your results. So, this invitation to be impeccable with your word is really an invitation to be careful about the words that you’re speaking to yourself, but also the words that you’re speaking to other people.

And as you’re inviting yourself into this experiment or this agreement with being more impeccable with your word, it brings greater intentionality. Are the words that you’re speaking loving? Are they kind? Are your words in alignment with your intentions, with what you want to create?

What would it look like for you to be even more impeccable with your word?

The second agreement is not to take things personally. This can be tricky because it’s very easy when somebody says something to us, or when we hear something, to automatically take that personally. Our initial reaction is to react and become defensive. But if we’re not careful, it can impact our thoughts, it can impact how we’re feeling about ourselves, and we can react to what other people around us are saying or doing.

What Don Miguel Ruiz is inviting us into is to understand that each and every person on this planet is inside of their own experience. That we all have our own content and curriculum. We all have our own upbringing, we all have our own perspectives, and so other people’s experiences and how they’re out in the world actually have nothing to do with us and everything to do with them.

What we have control over is how we’re reacting or how we’re responding to that. So as you’re listening and thinking about this agreement, what would it look like to really understand that nothing’s personal? And what would it mean for you to really, “okay this isn’t about me this is about the other person,” and I get to decide, do I want to send this person love? Do I want to react to it? Am I going to allow it to impact my self-image, what I believe about myself, and what I’m capable of?

So that second agreement, don’t take anything personally, and when we can recognize that it’s about them, not about us, it really helps us to be more free of the opinions and the ideas of other people.

The third agreement is don’t make assumptions. This is a powerful one. It’s very easy to tell ourselves stories about events, about circumstances, about what we think other people are thinking, and what they meant by their words. We’re constantly telling a story and that story is going through a lens of our own experience and how we interpret them.

This is an invitation to stay curious. Notice when we’re telling stories and we’re assuming things are going to happen or not going to happen. We’re assuming meaning. We’re telling stories about what other people are thinking or saying. And this is really an invitation to greater communication, to ask for clarity. “Tell me more” are some of the most powerful words we can say in a relationship with other people.

Not making assumptions is noticing when you’re finding yourself telling a story about something and really pausing to say, is this true? Do I know this to be true? And if not, then seek clarification.

And if you are going to make assumptions, personally I like to live with this idea of always assuming the best. Assume that people intended well. Assume that everybody’s doing their best, and of course better not to make assumptions, but if we’re going to make assumptions, why not assume the best of people?

The fourth and final agreement is always doing your best. I love that because we’re not meant to be perfect. We’re endeavoring to grow, to expand, and to acknowledge that my best today is not necessarily going to be my best tomorrow.

If you have a cold, if you’re sick, if you’ve been having lots of late nights and you’re tired, your best is not the same if you’re at full health, full strength. So always do your best is it really an invitation of bringing your best self to today, to this moment.

Don’t compare it to what I was capable of 10 years ago or what I think I should be doing, it’s really this inner commitment to always do your best. To bring your best self to this moment, to this day, and what I believe that does is it brings a sense of compassion to ourselves and to other people.

If you haven’t read The Four Agreements, I would certainly encourage you to do that, but just knowing what they are now, which one of these agreements would you like to experiment with this week? Be impeccable with your words, don’t take anything personally, don’t make assumptions, and always do your best. And allow these four agreements to be a guiding light in your day.